Dac Lac, Vietnam, May 1, 2013 -- China’s
Guangdong Evergrande and Zhetyssu of Kazakhstan have continued their winning
streak, finishing top in their respective pools after Wednesday‘s matches at
the 14th Asian Women’s Club Volleyball Championship.

In Pool A, Zhetyssu defeated rivals Idea
Khonkaen of Thailand 3-0 (25-20 25-18 25-22) to place first with eight points and
a perfect record, which includes a 3-2 win over Vietnam’s Lienviet Postbank and
a 3-2 victory over Chinese Taipei.

Evergrande topped Pool B with nine points
from three wins without losing a single set. Bo Tong Gang of DPR Korea was
second with six points from one win and two defeats, followed by PFU Blue Cats
of Japan at three points and winless Giti Pasand from Iran.

Zhetyssu of Kazakhstan defeated Idea
Khonkaen of Thailand in straight sets in their last Pool A round-robin
preliminaries.

After their first two set loss 20-25,
18-25, Tapaphaipun Chaisri and Pornthip Santrong of Idea Khonkaen worked well
together to stop the Kazakh defence with their exceptional attacks. Howevere, Zhetyssu
made the most of their height advantage to attack and block effectively to win
the hotly-contested third set 25-22 and the match.

Pornthip Santrong was the top scorer for
Idea Khonkaen with 16 points, while Irina Shenberger topscored for Zhetyssu
with 14 points.

After the match, Idea Khonkaen’s head coach
Banjong Sombat commented, “I think my team played well despite the fact that we
lost this crucial match. The weakest point of my team is our first-ball
reception. It’s still far from impressive. Losing 3-4 points from the unforced
receiving mistakes in each set can cause the match loss.

Hosts Vietnam registered a big win on
Wednesday when Lienviet Postbank team beat Taipei.
The Vietnamese side made a superb start with the first-set win 25-15 helped by Do Thi Minh’s cross-court spikes.

Taipei overcame their problems with
unforced spiking and serving mistakes to counteract the oppositions’ attacks
and took the next two sets 25-21, 26-24.

In the fourth set the hosts mixed the
offensive mobility of Do Thi Minh’s aggressive spikes and solid blockings by
Pham Thi Thu Trang and Nguyen Linh Chi to take them to a 25-25 tie. The players
from the Vietnamese side scored two more points to win the set 27-25.

In the tie-breaker, Lienviet Postbank
remained in form to lead all the way until they advanced 14-12, needing only
one extra point to win the match. Chen Wan-Ting carried out a sharp spike to
save a match point for Taipei before Lee Tzu-Ying completely ended her team’s
challenge when she spiked the ball out wide. Hosts Vietnam captured the decider
15-13 and the match.

Chen Wan-Ting led Taipei with 24 points while
Do Thi Minh scored a match-high of 20 points for Lienviet Postbank.

After beating Iran’s Giti Pasand in
straight sets in their opener and closest rivals PFU Blue Cats with the same margin
the following day, the Evergrande outclassed Bo Tong Gang in three straight sets.

The Evergrande players used their height
advantage to attack aggressively and block well at the net. Zhou Yuan and
Skowronska took turns penetrating the Korean defense with their explosive
spikes to help Evergrande take the first two sets 25-16 and 25-20.

Bo Tong Gang gave everything they had in
the third set, hoping to make amends for the unforced mistakes they played in
the previous two sets, but the Chinese proved too strong to beat. Evergrande
took the set 25-18 and the match.

PFU Blue Cats were no match for Giti Pasand
of Iran as team played with variety and demonstrated a high level of tactical
and technical prowess. As a result the Japanese took the first set 25-19.

Strengthened by Mao Kawakami’s powerful
spikes and Eri Iyonaga’s and Megumi Funasaki’s well-placed serves, the Japanese
won the second set 25-12 and then the third 25-8 to wrap up the match
comfortably.

The 14th Asian Women’s Club Volleyball Championship continues through to Sunday. The winning teams will advance to the semifinals, with the losers will play for the 5th to 8th places in the classification round.